The countdown has begun for one of Delaware’s most popular events, the Punkin Chunkin World Championship. Dover International Speedway will be the new host site for the World Championship Punkin Chunkin event.

The World Championship Punkin Chunkin Association (WCPCA) hosts a signature pumpkin-launching event each year, fueling innovative engineering and science-based ideas that draw spectators from all over. They believe that Punkin Chunkin cultivates the odd, challenging, and competitive quest for distance that inspires creativity, ingenuity, teamwork, and passion. It is this very dedication that drives teams to compete using science and engineering skills and brings spectators to the gate.

This year, you and seven friends could be tailgating at the 2014 Punkin Chunkin World Championship. Contest winner will receive one (1) tailgate pass on the fire line and eight (8) tickets for the Saturday, Oct. 25 event.

What started as a challenge in 1986 has turned into an epic, world-class competition drawing hurlers and mega crowds. For three days, engineers, both serious and home grown, bring their huge contraptions and give it all they’ve got to chunk their 8- to 10-pound pumpkin as far as it can go.

The gates open at 7:30 AM each day. All machines fire at least once a day, starting at 8:00 AM. The order can change from day to day depending on weather (they can’t shoot in foggy conditions), whether they finished all the machines the previous day, etc.

Image Courtesy of Rope, Inc.

They have to play it by ear, but usually they start on both ends of the firing line, alternating shots with the adult trebuchets and the Youth mechanical teams – catapults, trebuchets and human power. Once the youth mechanicals are done, they continue firing the adult mechanicals, moving towards the center of the firing line. Once they are done, they then move to the youth air cannons, the adult centrifugals and the adult air cannons. Then, after all that, they usually have a free-for-all period until dusk where the machines may fire as much as they wish.